Something I've wondered about for a while. Why do people typically claim that non-random battles are somehow better than having random battles? To me they seem to be about the same level of vexation, if not worse because the Non-Random Battles are a lie in theory.

To elaborate; from what I've heard people go nuts over non-random battles because it means they can pick and chose when they go into battle. No more screen warping and tossing you into combat whenever the RNG feels like it. Yet in practice, this never proves to be true. Even as far back as the SNES era.

Case in points:

Final Fantasy Mystic Quest: Most enemies unavoidable. You have to kill them to advance.

Mana Khemia series: Unpredictable movements, extremely fast movements, and night-time/god-speed-mode enemies ensure you will often get into battles you do not wish to engage in.

Final Fantasy XIII: Narrow corridors, enemies that are slightly faster than you, enemy heat-seeking lock on that can sometimes ignore terrain issues pretty much ensures you'll be fighting a majority of the things you come across.

If the point of Non-Random Battles is to give the player the freedom to avoid fighting whenever they wish; is it not a worse mechanic than purely random encounters due to the inherent lie present in the NRB system?

There might be games that disprove me, I don't know as I haven't played them. But that's why I'm bringing this up for discussion. To see if anyone has properly presented a game with a true, un-rigged NRB system or if others feel the same way I do or not on the NRB v RB discussion.

When they're done well, Like in Persona 3, they're strategic and provide an interesting challenge while giving you the choice whether or not you should fight or run. When they're done wrong, they end up being an annoyance. I know in one dungeon in Star Ocean: The Last Hope, I fought many enemies thanks to slim corridors and bad camera positions. On the plus side I got a lot of exp, on the negative side, I was wandering around that one dungeon 50 times, just trying to find one item. I think it goes without saying that I was more than a little annoyed. In Tales of Symphonia, on the other hand, I had gotten so good at avoiding enemies that I could go a whole dungeon without fighting more than one or two groups of enemies, and was fighting every boss sorely underleveled, so I had to leave the dungeon and grind to make up for it. Of course that's easy when it just means running into every enemy you see. Usually I'd be good in about 30 to 45 minutes.

So yeah, when done wrong, they can be just as annoying as random battles, but when done right, they're by far the best option.

Lufia: Ruins of Lore was a game where I would have preferred random encounters every 5-8 steps than the non-random encounters. Lee Babin's review does a better job of explaining it than I would. All I know is that Ruins of Lore is proof that sometimes non-random battles can be FUBAR.

I like how Millennium does it where you can choose your random encounter rate on the fly. I would pick freqent encounters when I was building levels then switch to a nonfrequent rate when exploring dungeons.

My favorite mechanic is in Eternal Eden where once a non-random encounter is compled, the enemy does not respawn. This made backtracking sidequests and occasional revisists to prior dungeons pleasurable because I didn't have to engage in needless fights. I was told that Panzer Dragoon Saga's random encounters are kinda like that where you can actually make creatures go extinct if you fight them enough or something like that.

P3 had a neat thingy that allowed people to send people to fight while main character goes around exploring.I think that was taken out of P4, though.Random battles discourage exploring, and I prefer to explore every inch of a game for some weird reason.

For example, in P4, you can revisit a previously finished dungeon to fight an optional boss. Usually, my party level is high enough as is so I appreciate having the option to skip unnecessary battles. Yeah you might get hit by one or two shadows, but never to the point of frustration. I wouldn't have considered fighting those optional bosses if the game had random battles.

But I agree that some games are just fucked up and give the illusion of NRB.

Random battles is the main reason why I never bothered with more than a few quests in a lot of games, just too damn annoying.

With visible encounters, This allows for more control on loot and farming from players. but on the other hand, whole element of surprise is lost. Also, what people dislike about the random encounters is mostly when a game with a high encounter rates and being in a huge dungeon . If the encounter rate is low or can be modified (FF8), then I don't think people have too much objections to it.

Non-random battles are better if they are done well like in Grandia games, Evolution games, or Growlanser Heritage of War. Grandia and Evolution basically have the same exact encounter system. You can generally avoid enemies if you want to (though I recall it being quite difficult or impossible in Grandia 1 many times) but if you touch them you enter a battle sequence. If you run into them from behind you get the advantage and vice versa. Growlanser Heritage of War there is no battle sequence transition of any kind, you just fight them or run past them as you will in realtime (though you can pause to issue commands). However, there are many games where these kinds of systems wouldn't really work so I can understand the use of random encounters.

I was told that Panzer Dragoon Saga's random encounters are kinda like that where you can actually make creatures go extinct if you fight them enough or something like that.

Yeah prettymuch. In that game your radar changes color depending on the likelihood of random encounters occuring. Red means high chance blue means little or no chance. If you fight enough in the same area the radar will generally change color and you won't get into any more battles, or far fewer.

I mentioned in the golden sun thread that though it's higher on the world map the in dungeon random encounter rate was just perfect. Pretty much the lowest I've ever seen. Which might be TOO low in some games, but perfect for a game where everything's a minipuzzle.

Wild Arms is great too. A ! pops up over your head when there's a encounter and you can, within reasonable limits, just push a button to avoid the fight.

For non-random Eternal Eden was already mentioned. Kill something and it's gone forever. I don't think it made the most out of the idea(I felt overleveled later, when that system should let you control experience. You also felt obligated to kill everything, going against avoidable encounters), but it had potential. Unfortunately it's probably not something you'd see much of in retails games. That deflates game length and '100 hour quest' is a sales bullet point.

I'll like FF12s too, though it's not the only game that does that way(Though it's more common in action rpgs than pure ones). Battles on the field instead of on their own screen is a plus in it's own right, but what I really like is it increasing the value of buffs. They don't just go away when you kill what you're fighting so it's not a waste of time to cast them.

Yeah, as I mentioned in that rambling thread I started, I actually really like FF:MQ but the non-random battles get on me. It also pissed me off later on in CT when you'd get enemies jumping out of nowhere at you.

I think things are better when enemies behave in a specific way on the map. Like, moving in different patterns, for instance. Or if you have something like in Earthbound or VP where it's less avoiding fights and more about getting opening attacks. I also recall some other game where you could slash your sword on the map and if you hit an enemy before they got to you you'd get an opening attack. I think it was top down. What the hell was that?

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Like in Persona 3...

Oh, right. They actually worked really well in P3 since you could switch up your weapons. And it also felt reasonably actiony, too, since your swing speed was fast.

BTW, random encounters or non-random, I think really high/100% run chances are good, like in Chrono Cross. Basically no matter how good a game's battle system is, if it's not an action RPG, I'll probably get tired of battles eventually. Being able to run from any fight is just a nice courtesy.

Then again I'd also advocate for a game without any regular battles, that instead had a lot of smaller boss battles more frequently, because generally boss battles are special encounters that are given a lot of care into how they're set up and are far more interesting than regular encounters, although I can't really think of any RPGs off hand that did this. Basically I feel like every encounter should just be meaningful.

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EDIT: I'm being gangster by calling it a "pizzle", for normal folk, I meant puzzles...just some typos are kinda funny

'Pizzle' is farmer-talk for bull-penises, frequently of the mummefied variety, such as those used to make canes, or dog chew toys. My parents bought the dogs one once. That was creepy. It smelled like barbecue sauce btw. And it's not like I was holding it and sniffing it but rather the smell just permeated throughout the entire house. I think this is somehow responsible for me being insane, a furry, and a vegetarian, all at the same time.

:(

Logged

o/` I do not feel joy o/`o/` I do not dream o/`o/` I only stare at the door and smoke o/`

Lufia: Ruins of Lore was a game where I would have preferred random encounters every 5-8 steps than the non-random encounters. Lee Babin's review does a better job of explaining it than I would. All I know is that Ruins of Lore is proof that sometimes non-random battles can be FUBAR.

You mean Lufia: Horseshit of Lore, because that's what it was, a fetid pile of horseshit.

EDIT: I'm being gangster by calling it a "pizzle", for normal folk, I meant puzzles...just some typos are kinda funny

'Pizzle' is farmer-talk for bull-penises, frequently of the mummefied variety, such as those used to make canes, or dog chew toys. My parents bought the dogs one once. That was creepy. It smelled like barbecue sauce btw. And it's not like I was holding it and sniffing it but rather the smell just permeated throughout the entire house. I think this is somehow responsible for me being insane, a furry, and a vegetarian, all at the same time.

I didn't like much the battles in Dragon Age: Origins.They're not random and to make thigns worse, they are scripted, there will always be 2 enemies on said corner, on mage casting something, etc. It kills a lot of the variety not to mention the huge amount of battles you can't run away. When the encounter is random as boring as it is, you can use the command escape in most games and you're done, in a game like dragon age you have to endure the whole thing.I'm complaining about because as the game went on I found the combat to be a little boring most of the times but I have no better proposal to fix it.Between the repetition of Dragon Age's combat and the insanely high encounter rate of Dragon quest, I'd take Dragon Age any day.